UAA students extend a warm, helping hand

A few weeks ago, as they labored through their mandatory "capstone" project in Nursing Science 411, these same eight worried: Will we survive this?

The capstone is public health "boot camp," thrusting nurse wannabes smack into a simmering health issue in Anchorage. They have eight weeks to explore, assess, propose and deliver a solution.

Their professor, Catherine Sullivan, had heard of a newly arrived group of Bhutanese and Sudanese refugees, in Anchorage for just two months. She got permission for the students to meet the newcomers and assess their health care needs.

On a warm day in mid-September, the nursing students headed from campus to a sunny classroom behind St. Anthony's Church on Kelvin Street. This long, narrow room, with tiny offices and a computer lab tucked around its perimeter, is the Welcome Center for Catholic Social Services' Refugee Assistance and Immigration Service (RAIS). Here the nursing students met the population that needed their help.

Introducing the two groups to each other was Mirna Howard, a tiny, dark-haired young woman from Guatemala who teaches the orientation and life skills and work readiness classes for refugee service. The newcomers, some with young children in their laps, sat scattered among the classroom tables. The women's flowing pastel dresses and open-toed shoes seemed comfortable enough, though hardly winter-worthy. Two interpreters -- one for the Sudanese and one for the Bhutanese -- translated.

Nursing students asked clients about health practices back home. Did they use herbs and medicine together? What did they do for a headache? Who made important decisions in the family? What food did they like to eat and how did they prepare it? As newcomers to Alaska, what were they most worried about?

The answers supplied the raw material the students needed to identify a health gap, something they could fill.

In all their interviews, one message came through loud and clear: These brand new Alaskans had never seen snow. They were worried about living in a cold climate, having enough warm clothes and relying on foot travel and public transportation to navigate their new city.

DIFFERENT BACKGROUNDS

The seniors in Sullivan's class were a tight bunch. They chose each other for this project.

After 18 months of an intense nursing program that they labeled "grueling," they wished to navigate this final community project with fellow students they trusted to get the work done.

The team was comprised of a mix of older and younger students from a variety of backgrounds. Three of them -- Teri Carr, Kristina Carpenter and Tyhesia White -- carpooled in together from Wasilla every day, often leaving for campus as early as 5:30 a.m.

White, married and the mom of two school-age boys, was blunt about why she chose nursing. "I wanted to break the long cycle of beauticians in my family," she said, matter-of-factly. Carr, in her early 20s, decided to become a nurse as a young girl after she watched several family members battle long illnesses.

James Crump, the only male in the group, worked 13 years for Fed Ex before tapping back into his biology undergraduate degree to pursue nursing.

The Bhutanese were displaced years ago. Many had farmed in Bhutan for years, only to find themselves without the necessary government paperwork to stay. They were bounced into refugee camps in Nepal for up to 18 years, they said, eventually arriving in Anchorage with very little but the hope for a new life.

Tulsi Subedi said he had worked as a teacher in the refugee camps in Nepal. His wife, Krishna Maya Subedi, explained that she was only a year away from her master's degree in mathematics.

In work sessions, the students decided that if they could help outfit the newcomers in warm coats, boots, gloves and hats, they would be doing a big service. They solicited donations and made their nursing school main office a repository for incoming items.

The response was huge, and on the day they returned to the Welcome Center to teach the refugees about dressing for winter weather, they had a large selection of warm items for all ages.

TEACHING DAY

In November the students returned to the center to do their teaching. The classroom was set up like a conference, with long tables connected along each wall.

Tyheshia White opened the event with a slide show of winter scenes that depicted Alaskans having fun in the snow, but also included a warning image of what frostbite looks like on human skin.

Next came a skit designed to introduce proper clothing layers for warmth. Student Pattie Arthur played the "mom" of two kids she was trying to get out the door to catch the school bus. Her "son," Crump, proudly announced that he had on his long johns and wool socks. "Mom" added a vest over his school clothes as an important middle layer beneath his outer jacket.

Meantime, "daughter," student Nikki See, was too busy fussing with her curly blonde hair to get dressed warmly. As she rushed out the door for the bus, she left behind her coat, hat and gloves and shivered miserably at the bus stop. The refugees laughed merrily when a giant yellow cardboard "school bus" arrived to cart away the kids.

The nursing students next offered each refugee hand sanitizer and a thermometer, which were an instant hit as everyone sampled his or her own temperature. Actually owning his own thermometer seemed phenomenal to Bhutanese refugee Raghu Nath Mishra. "In the refugee camp, we had one thermometer, for everyone!" he recalled.

After other activities, the day culminated with two dozen refugees searching through the donated coats and warm gear to outfit themselves and their children.

As the day wound down, one Bhutanese man stepped forward to offer a formal thank you. In halting but careful English, he said, "We are really, really happy... that we got the way about how to prevent from the seasonal flu... and how to protect ourselves from the cold weather.

"It was very much essential and very much necessary for we people, as we came from the hot regions and we had never seen snow in our life."

He clasped his hands together and made a small bow to the gathered nursing students as the rest of the room broke into noisy applause.

---

Kathleen McCoy works as an electronic media specialist at the University of Alaska Anchorage.